The Vision (10.9.26): Thomas Watson's Strategies for Keeping the Tenth Commandment

 

Image: Thomas Watson (1620-1686)

Note: Devotion taken from last Sunday's sermon on Exodus 20:17.

Exodus 20:17 Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour's.

The tenth commandment is the final and crowing commandment of the Ten Words.  In the second table, we see the movement from sinful deeds (dishonor of parents, murder, adultery, stealing), to sinful words (false witness), and now to sinful thoughts (don’t covet). If we are honest, we will acknowledge that we have entertained the doing of these things in our heart of hearts. A.W. Pink said that in this commandment, God “proclaims His rights over the hidden realm of desires.”

The Puritan minister Thomas Watson (1620-1686) called covetousness “the mother of all sins.”  Indeed, this commandment touches on the root of nearly all our sinful inclinations. He offered four strategies for the believer for dealing with covetousness:

1.     We must exercise faith:

We must trust in the Lord. The person who is consumed with covetousness lacks faith or trust in God.  “The root of covetousness is distrust of God’s providence.”  “Faith is the cure of care.”  Covetousness shows a lack of trust in God’s promise of provision (cf. Matt 6:25-34).

“Faith, by divine chemistry, extracts comfort out of God.  A little with God is sweet.  Thus, faith is a remedy against covetousness; it overcomes not only fear of the world, but love of the world.”

2.      We must employ judicious considerations:

By this Watson meant that the believer should remember that all the things that the world prizes most will not bring true and lasting satisfaction.  If you had everything you think you wanted, your spiritual problems would not be magically solved.  “The things of the world can no more ease a troubled spirit than a gold cap can cure the headache.”

3.      We must covet spiritual things more than earthly things.

Covet grace.  Covet heaven.  “If we covet heaven more, we shall covet earth less.”

4.      Pray for a heavenly mind.

Watson’s prayer was this: “Lord, dig the earth out of my heart; teach me how to possess the world, and not love it; how to hold it in my hand, and not let it get into my heart.”

After these four strategies, Watson ends by saying that “the best remedy is contentment.  If we are content with our own, we shall not covet that which is another’s.”  He added, “He who has enough, will not covet that which is another’s.”

May the Lord help us to employ these strategies and others as we grow in godliness.

Grace and peace, Pastor Jeff Riddle

The Holy Ghost is True and Eternal God

Image: September morning, North Garden, Virginia 2026

(Notes from last Wednesday's Midweek Meeting series through Belgic Confession):

Belgic Confession:

Article 11 The Holy Ghost is True and Eternal God

We believe and confess also that the Holy Ghost from eternity proceeds from the Father1 and Son,2 and therefore is neither made, created, nor begotten, but only proceedeth from both; who in order is the third person of the Holy Trinity, of one and the same essence, majesty, and glory with the Father and the Son; and therefore is the true and eternal God, as the Holy Scriptures teach us.3

1 Ps. 33:6, 17; John 14:16

2 Gal. 4:6; Rom. 8:9; John 15:26

3 Gen. 1:2; Isa. 48:16; 61:1; Acts 5:3–4; 28:25; 1 Cor. 3:16; 6:19; Ps. 139:7.

Notes:

·         Articles 8-11 in the Belgic Confession teach the doctrine of the Trinity. There is one God who is from all eternity Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Article 10 focuses on Jesus Christ as True and Eternal God. Now, Article 11 says the Holy Ghost is True and Eternal God. We are not unitarians!

·         Charismatics speak a lot about the Holy Spirit, but Reformed believers also believe in the Holy Spirit. B. B. Warfield called John Calvin the theologian of the Holy Spirit.

·         The Trinity: The Father: eternally unbegotten. The Son: eternally begotten of the Father. The Spirit eternally proceeding (or spirating) from the Father (John 14:16) AND the Son (John 15:16). Contrast the Eastern Orthodox Church which says procession is only from the Father.

·         The Spirit is the same essence with the Father and the Son and is equal in power and glory with the Father and the Son. See Acts 5:3-4 which speaks of the lying to the Spirit and lying to God in parallel. The Spirit is God.

·         What are some of the operations or works of the Spirit? Here are a few:

-The Spirit is the Creator (Gen. 1:2) with the Father (Gen. 1:1) and The Son (John 1:3).

-The Spirit is omnipresent (Psalm 139:7).

-The Spirit sent and anointed prophets, apostles, and ministers (Isaiah 48:16; 61:1).

-The Spirit was at work in the conception/incarnation of Christ (Luke 1:35).

-The Spirit raised Christ from the dead (Rom 8:11).

-The Spirit brings about the new birth/regeneration (John 3:5-8).

-The Spirit does the work of sanctification (Rom. 15:6; 1 Cor. 6:11; 2 Thess. 2:13; 1 Peter 1:2).

-The Spirit inspired the Scriptures and speaks through them (Acts 28:25; 2 Tim 3:16).

-The Spirit indwells the believer (Rom. 8:9-16; 1 Cor. 6:19).

Grace and peace, Pastor Jeff Riddle

The Vision (9.18.26): The Confession of the Man Who Had Dwelt Among the Tombs

 

Image: Morning scene, North Garden, Virginia, September 2026

Note: Devotion taken from last Sunday's sermon on Mark 5:1-20:

Mark 5:1-20 records Christ’s casting out a Legion of demons from a man “dwelling among the tombs” in the country of the Gadarenes (vv. 1-2). After Christ cast out this legion, sending them into a nearby herd of swine, the man was found “sitting, and clothed, and in his right mind” (v. 15).

When Christ came to the ship to depart from that land, the former demoniac asked if he might go with the Lord, that “he might be with him. Howbeit Jesus suffered him not” (vv. 18-19).

There is a spiritual lesson here, no doubt.  The Lord Jesus acquiesced to the demonic request to be sent into the swine (v. 13).  He agreed to the populace’s request that he leave town (v. 17).  The only request he denied was the one that came from the former demoniac who had become his disciple!  Does it not often seem to us, from our human perspective, that God allows the desires of the wicked to prosper while the simple requests of the saints are denied?  How much greater is his wisdom! 

The Lord Jesus tells him, “Go home to thy friends, and tell them how great things the Lord hath done for thee, and hath had compassion on thee” (v. 19). Perhaps this man had exotic dreams of traveling with Christ to faraway places to preach the gospel, and the Lord sent him instead into his own patria, to his own household, family, friends, neighbors. The Lord Jesus tells some men to go and follow him. He tells others to stay and follow him.

Mark reports the man’s obedience, “And he departed, and began to publish in Decapolis how great things Jesus had done for him: and all men did marvel” (20).

These final verses (vv. 19-20) offer a striking Christological statement. Christ told the man to go and tell what the Lord (God) had done for him (cf. Luke 8:39). The man went and told what (the Lord) Jesus had done for him.

The man who had dwelt among the tombs was now confessing, “Jesus is Lord.”

Grace and peace, Pastor Jeff Riddle

The Vision (9.11.26): Great Storm, Great Calm, Great Awe

 

Image: Summer evening, North Garden, Virginia.

Note: Devotion taken from last Sunday's sermon on Mark 4:36-41:

The record of Christ stilling the storm in Mark 4:36-41 has been a comfort to many believers over the years, as they have encountered their own storms.  It might be the storm of losing a job, of failing in a business, of having conflict with a parent, spouse, or child, of losing a loved one, of serious illness, of facing deep spiritual discouragement, depression, or despair.

The adjective “great (Greek: mega)” is repeated three times in this passage. There was a “great [mega] storm of wind” (v. 37), a “great [mega] calm” (v. 39), and a “great [mega] fear or awe” (v. 41, where the AV reads, “they feared exceedingly”) in the aftermath.

From this account we gain the application that we are to rely upon Christ in all the circumstances of life and never doubt his tender concern for us.

We should first consider the comfort of the fact that the Lord Jesus was awakened by the cries of his disciples in their distress.

Matthew Henry observed, “When Christ seems as if he slept in a storm, he is awakened by the prayers of his people; when we know not what to do; our eye must be to him (2 Chron 20:12); we may be at our wit’s end, but not our faith’s end, while we have a Savior to go to.”

Sadly, even our prayers to Christ in distress can take on that complaining tone of the disciples, “Master, carest thou not that we perish?” (v. 38).

Christ himself taught his disciples in the Sermon on the Mount not to be overcome by worry (Matthew 6: 25-34).

Someone said, “Worry is an old man, with bended head, carrying a load of feathers which he thinks are lead.”

Another wrote,

Fear knocked at the door.

Faith answered.

No one was there.

Peter exhorted that we are to be “Casting all our care upon him; for he careth for you” (1 Peter 5:7).

Christ told his disciples that every hair upon their head were all numbered by the sovereign Father (Matthew 10:30).

Some years back I read a devotional book titled Jesus is Victor by Corrie Ten Boom, the Dutch believer whose family was sent to a concentration during WW2, where her aged father and beloved sister would both die.

She writes of her initial imprisonment which included four months of solitary confinement in a dark dank cell:

Once I stood with my back against the wall with my hands spread out, as if to try to push away the walls that were closing in on me.  I was dead scared.  I cried out, “Lord, I’m not strong enough to endure this.  I don’t have the faith!”

Suddenly I noticed an ant roaming the floor of the cell for days.  I had just mopped the floor with a wet rag, and the moment the ant felt the water on the stones, he ran straight to his tiny hole in the wall.

Then it was that the Lord said to me, “What about that ant?  He didn’t stop to look at the wet rag or his weak feet—he went straight to his hiding place.  Corrie, don’t look at your faith; it is weak, like the tiny feet of that ant.  Don’t dwell on the treatment you might receive from these cruel people.  I am your hiding place, and you can come running to Me just like that ant disappeared into that hole in the wall (pp. 79-80).

Let us remember that though the Lord may permit great storms, he also provides great calm, that issue in great awe.

Grace and peace, Pastor Jeff Riddle

The Vision (9.4.26): The Secretly Growing Seed

 

Note: Devotion taken from last Sunday's sermon on Mark 4:26-34.

“And he said, so is the kingdom of God, as if a man should cast seed into the ground… and the seed should spring and grow up, he knoweth not how” (Mark 4:27-28).

“It is like a grain of mustard seed, which… is less than all the seeds that be in the earth: but when it is sown, it groweth up... and shooteth out great branches…” (Mark 4:31-32).

What do we learn from our Lord’s parables of the secretly growing seed (Mark 4:26-29) and the mustard seed (Mark 4:30-32)?

First, we need to apply this teaching to our understanding of Christ’s kingdom. It is here, but not yet.

The Lord is sovereign over his own work. His kingdom is here, and it is secretly growing, just like that seed in the parable. It is his work. He will bring the fruit when he is pleased to do so and according to his timetable. Rest assured, however, a harvest time is coming.

Sometimes the present kingdom can look to us like such a small and weak thing. No bigger than a mustard seed. But it has a great God behind it. And when he is pleased it will become a mighty branch and a resting place for men from many nations.

As the prophet Zechariah asked, “For who hath despised the day of small things?” (Zech. 4:10).

That is the view from the macro-scale, but we can also apply this, secondly, to the micro-scale.

You may look at the seed sown in you and see little growth and no fruit, and you may despair.

You may look at the small seed sown in the lives of loved ones, children, friends, and neighbors, and ask, Where’s the fruit?

We are reminded today to put our trust in the Lord. The kingdom is like a secretly growing seed. It is small as a mustard seed. But it is a great God’s work, and he who began this good work will be faithful to complete it. Consider the words of James:

James 5: ⁷ Be patient therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord. Behold, the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and hath long patience for it, until he receive the early and latter rain.

⁸ Be ye also patient; stablish your hearts: for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh.

All the aches and pains and disappointments will indeed be ended at the time when Christ comes again with power and great glory. It will be the time of the final harvest, the final resurrection. So, let us take heart, fellow pilgrims. Let us be steadfast, unmoving, always abounding in the work of the Lord.

He is lisping this to us in ways we can understand and untangling it for us in ways we can grasp, as he did to the first disciples in parables (Mark 4:33-34).

The kingdom has come in Christ’s incarnational ministry. It is here right now. And it will be here one day in ways greater than we ever could have asked or imagined.

Grace and peace, Pastor Jeff Riddle

The Vision (8.28.26): Is a candle brought to be put under a bushel?

 

Note: Devotional taken from last Sunday's sermon on Mark 4:21-25.

And he said unto them, Is a candle brought to be put under a bushel, or under a bed? and not to be set on a candlestick? (Mark 4:21)

In his explanation of the parable of the sower, Christ told his disciples that the “good ground” was those who heard the word, received it, and brought forth fruit (Mark 4:20).

He followed this up with figurative teaching about a lamp or light that should not be hidden.

The simplest and most sparsely furnished first century home would have had these basic items, an earthen lamp, a basket, and a mat that rolled out into a bed.  The Lord Jesus is saying that when it is night a man does not take the candle or lamp and hide it under a bushel basket or under his bedding, but he puts it on a candlestick or lampstand.  And the higher you put it the more it illumines the room.

The Lord Jesus is here speaking about the responsibility of believers (good ground hearers) to be a source of light and truth in the world.  They have been given insight that others do not have.  They are glowing with the knowledge of the gospel and of Christ. This is not be hidden or obfuscated.

In the Sermon on the Mount, Christ made a similar point:

Matthew 5: ¹⁴ Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid.

¹⁵ Neither do men light a candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick; and it giveth light unto all that are in the house.

¹⁶ Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.

We sometimes sing the children’s song based on this parable: “This little light of mine, I’m gonna to let it shine….”

In John’s Gospel there is an account of a man named Nicodemus, a Pharisee and a “ruler of the Jews” who came to Christ “by night” (3:1-2). Later there is mention of another man named Joseph of Arimathea whom John describes as “being a disciple of Jesus, but secretly for fear of the Jews” (John 19:38).

John records that when Christ was crucified and died on the cross, it was indeed Joseph who went to Pilate and asked for the Lord’s body for burial (John 19:40-42). John also notes that Nicodemus was there helping him (v.39).

Witnessing the cross work of Christ made these men finally cast caution to the wind and let their light shine, as they made it publicly known, whatever the consequences, that they were his disciples.

In John Calvin’s day there was a group of Frenchmen who had privately embraced the gospel but publicly and outwardly had remained in the Roman Church. Calvin wrote several tracts calling these men “Nicodemites” and urging them to declare outwardly what they had confessed inwardly.

Are we “good ground” hearers of the Word? Have we heard and received that Word, and are we bearing kingdom fruit?

If so we must not hide the light but set it as high as we can that others might see and be drawn to Christ.

Grace and peace, Pastor Jeff Riddle

The Vision (8.14.26): Calvin on The Self-Authenticating Nature of Scripture

 

“My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me” (John 10:27).

In our midweek study through the Belgic Confession, we were looking last Wednesday at this confession’s stress on what is called the self-authenticating (autopistic) nature of the Bible. Why do we believe the Bible’s authority? The Belgic Confession says, the Holy Spirit witnesses to our hearts that the Scriptures are from God, “whereof they carry the evidence in themselves.”

Here is what John Calvin (1509-1564), the great Reformer in Geneva, Switzerland, had to say about Scripture’s testimony to itself:

Let this point therefore stand: that those whom the Holy Spirit has inwardly taught truly rest upon Scripture, and that Scripture indeed is self-authenticated [autopiston]; hence it is not right to subject it to proof and reasoning. And the certainty it deserves with us, it attains by the testimony of the Spirit. For even if it wins reverence for itself by its own majesty, it seriously affects us only when it is sealed upon our hearts through the Spirit. Therefore, illumined by his power, we believe neither by our own nor by anyone else’s judgment that Scripture is from God; but above all human judgment we affirm with utter certainty (just as if we were gazing upon the very majesty of God himself) that it has flowed to us from the very mouth of God by the ministry of men. We seek no proofs, no marks of genuineness upon which our judgment may lean; but we subject our judgment and wit to it as to a thing far beyond any guesswork! This we do, not as persons accustomed to seize upon some unknown thing, which, under closer scrutiny, displeases them, but fully conscious that we hold the unassailable truth! Nor do we do this as those miserable men who habitually bind over their minds to the thralldom of superstition; but we feel that the undoubted power of his divine majesty lives and breathes there. By this power we are drawn and inflamed, knowingly and willingly, to obey him, yet also more vitally and more effectively than by mere human willing or knowing! (Institutes of the Christian Religion, 1.7.5).

May the Spirit continue to affirm the self-authenticating nature of the Holy Scriptures to his people.

Grace and peace, Pastor Jeff Riddle

The Vision (8.7.26): Water out of the Rock

 

Devotion based on Sunday afternoon sermon on Exodus 17 on July 26, 2026.

Exodus 17:3 And the people thirsted there for water; and the people murmured against Moses, and said, Wherefore is this that thou hast brought us up out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and our cattle with thirst?

Exodus 17:6 Behold, I will stand before thee there upon the rock in Horeb; and thou shalt smite the rock, and there shall come water out of it, that the people may drink. And Moses did so in the sight of the elders of Israel.

In Exodus 17, the LORD answers the chiding, the striving, and the murmuring of his people, not with the immediate wrath and judgement it rightly deserved but with water from the rock.

In commenting on this passage, Edmund Clowney noted how God said to Moses in v. 6: “Behold, I will stand before thee there upon the rock in Horeb.” Clowney added: “God will stand before a man. God will stand in the prisoner’s dock. He will stand before the upraised rod of Moses, as though he were a guilty prisoner….” He continued: “Still more—incredibly, God says to Moses, ‘Thou shalt smite the rock!’ The rock on which God stands is the symbol of God himself. God’s name is the rock (Deut 32:4, 31). Moses raises his rod and strikes the Rock” (in E. Radmacher, Ed., Can We Trust the Bible?, 48). Clowney, of course, sees in this account a foreshadowing of the cross of Christ!

From the one stricken comes a river of life. Indeed, we cannot read of water being given to a thirsty people without thinking of Christ’s description of himself as “living water” when he spoke to the Samaritan woman at the well (John 4:10). He also declared on that occasion:

But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life (John 4:14).

The apostle Paul makes a similar point to Clowney in 1 Corinthians 10:4 when he says of the Israelites of that time that they “did all drink the same spiritual drink: for they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them: and that Rock was Christ.”

In Christ God answered our chiding and striving and murmuring with living water. His banner over us is love (Song of Solomon 2:4).

Grace and peace, Pastor Jeff Riddle

The Vision (7.31.26): The Ordination of the Twelve

 

Note: Devotional based on Sunday morning sermon on July 26, 2026.

Mark 3:14 And he ordained twelve, that they should be with him, and that he might send them forth to preach, 15 And to have power to heal sicknesses, and to cast out devils:

We see in the early chapters of Mark that many men flocked to Christ as he began his ministry. They would later abandon him when he went to the cross.

Among his many followers he called some to be his disciples. These included Simon and Andrew, James and John, and Levi (Mark 1:16-20; 2:14).

Mark 3:14-19 describes how he set apart or ordained Twelve of these men who would serve as Apostles.

It begins in v. 14 with the simple statement: “And he ordained twelve.”

Mark then notes two reasons for their appointment:

First, that they might be with him (v. 14a). The Lord Jesus is Immanuel, “God with us.”  Notice that Mark does not say that he appointed twelve that they might go to rabbinic school or seminary.  Their education or training for their task would come from spending time with the Master.  The primary task of the apostles will be the accurate preaching and writing about the life, ministry, death, and resurrection of the Lord Jesus.  To do this, they had to be with him, and he would remain with them to the very end of the age (cf. Matthew 28:19-20).

Second, that they might be sent out to minister in his name (vv. 14-15). This involves preaching (v. 14b) and healing (including casting out evil spirits) (v. 15). Notice in the final chapter of Mark how the risen Christ commissions these same men (sans Judas Iscariot) to preach the gospel to every creature (16:15) and to perform the extra-ordinary apostolic signs including healing and casting out devils (16:17-18, 20). Note: This is another proof for the authenticity and originality of Mark’s Ending!

This was a special calling for the apostles, but callings will extend to ordinary ministers after them.

Hudson Taylor (1832-1905), pioneer missionary to China, wrote to his colleagues after the death of his beloved wife after childbirth:

 

I trust we are all satisfied that we are God’s servants, sent by Him, to the various posts we occupy, and that we are doing His work in them.  He set before us open doors we have entered, and in past times of excitement He has preserved us.  We did not come to China because missionary work here was either safe or easy, but because He had called us.  We did not enter upon our present positions under guarantee of human protection, but relying on the promises of his presence.  The accidents of ease or difficulty, of apparent safety or danger, of man’s approval or disapproval, in no wise affect our duty.

Let us follow and serve him where he has called us.

Grace and peace, Pastor Jeff Riddle

The Vision (7.24.26): Do Christian today still keep the sabbath?

 

Image: Morning skies, North Garden, Virginia, July 2026.

Note: Devotion taken from last Sunday's sermon on Mark 2:23--3:6.

Is the moral law of God, as epitomized in the Ten Commandments, still binding on the consciences of believers today?

We would probably not have an argument over 9 of the 10 commandments. The controversial one would be the fourth commandment: Remember the sabbath day to keep it holy (Exodus 20:8).

Many evangelicals today would say this law is now abrogated, like the dietary rules or the keeping of the Passover.

One popular Study Bible (MacArthur’s) has a note at Exodus 20:8 which says of the fourth commandment, “Belonging especially to Israel under the Mosaic economy, the Sabbath could not apply to the believer of the church age for he is living in a new economy” (p. 125).

Reformed (Biblical) theology, however, rejects the rejection of the Sabbath.

We maintain that God’s moral law has not fundamentally changed. The fourth commandment is a creation ordinance. It was established when God made the world in the space of six day and all very good and then rested on the seventh day (Exodus 20:11), and it remains.

The only shift that has occurred in this commandment since the coming of Christ is that the sabbath is no longer a seventh day sabbath, but it is now a first day sabbath, the day when Christ was gloriously raised from the dead (John 20:1, 19; Acts 20:6-7; 1 Corinthians 16:1-2). So, from creation to the resurrection, the sabbath was the seventh day, and from the resurrection of Christ till the second coming, it is the first day of the week.

As Paul wrote in Hebrews 4:9: “There remaineth therefore a rest [sabbatismos] to the people of God.”

We believe that when we look at the Scriptures, and especially at the Gospels, we find that Christ nowhere rejected the sabbath, although he did reject those who were adding unbiblical laws about the sabbath (like forbidding works of necessity, Mark 2:23-28, and mercy, Mark 3:1-6).

Christ affirmed Biblical sabbath keeping and rejected unbiblical sabbath keeping.

On this special day we set aside what is lawful to do on other days and give ourselves to the public and private exercises of God’s worship.

Let us follow Christ’s teaching and example and call the sabbath a delight (Isaiah 58:13). Let us not think that we have to keep the sabbath, but that we get to keep the sabbath.

Grace and peace, Pastor Jeff Riddle

The Vision (7.17.26): Murmuring & Manna

 

Image: July evening sky, North Garden, Virginia.

Note: Devotion taken from Lord's Day afternoon sermon on July 5, 2026.

And the whole congregation of the children of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness (Exodus 16:2).

And when the children of Israel saw it, they said one to another, It is manna: for they wist not what it was. And Moses said unto them, This is the bread which the Lord hath given you to eat (Exodus 16:15).

Exodus 16:1-21 describes the pilgrimage of Israel after leaving its bondage in Egypt, as they move from Elim to the wilderness of Sin on their way to Sinai where they will receive God’s law.

Here are three spiritual applications one might draw from this passage:

Notice first: The LORD meets their murmuring with manna.

When the people murmur against Moses and Aaron, Moses tells them, “your murmurings are not against us, but against the LORD” (v.8). Nevertheless, the LORD did not pour out his wrath on them or abandon them. Instead, he gave them quail in the evening and manna (literally, “What is it?”) in the morning. The LORD is great in grace, mercy, and compassion toward his elect people. As Paul wrote to Timothy, “If we believe not [i.e., if we are not faithful], yet he abideth faithful: he cannot deny himself” (2 Tim 2:13).

Notice second: This passage challenges us to consider our confidence in the Lord’s provision for us.

He provided for the Israelites of old even though they murmured. Will he not provide for us in our material and spiritual needs?

In Philippians 4:19, Paul said, “But my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus.”

As the Psalmist noted, “the cattle on a thousand hills are thine” (Ps 50:10).

Notice Third: The provision of manna in the wilderness points toward a greater fulfillment of the LORD provision in Christ for spiritually hungry and thirsty men and women.

In John 6, after feeding five thousand physically hungry men, Christ declared,, “I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst” (John 6:35).

After reminding them that their fathers “ate manna in the wilderness, and are dead,” Christ added, “I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world” (v.51).

The Lord did indeed meet our murmuring with manna, even the Lord Jesus Christ.

To Him be all praise and glory!

Grace and peace, Pastor Jeff Riddle

The Vision (7.10.26): Christ: The Bridegroom

 

Image: Detail, Roman wedding scene on a sarcophagus, second century, British Museum, London.

Note: Devotion taken from last Sunday's sermon on Mark 2:18-22.

“And Jesus said unto them, Can the children of the bridechamber fast, while the bridegroom is with them? as long as they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast” (Mark 2:19).

In Christ’s early ministry he attracted both disciples and critics.

In Mark 2:18 the critics ask, “Why do the disciples of John and of the Pharisees fast, but thy disciples fast not?” They were essentially accusing him of not teaching orthopraxy, right conduct.

We have Christ’s response in v. 19 with his own question: “Can the children of the bridechamber fast, while the bridegroom is with them?”

He poses here a parable or an analogy. Christ is like a Bridegroom who has come. In a first century Jewish wedding, the bride and the wedding party would wait for the coming of the Bridegroom (see Christ’s parable of the wise and foolish virgins regarding his second coming in Matt 25:1-13). When the Bridegroom arrived the wedding celebration began.

Here in Mark 2:19 Christ speaks about his first advent or first coming. Jesus Christ, the Son of God, came into this world to claim his Bride, the people of God, the Church. Those who are his disciples are “the children of the bridechamber.” They are part of the wedding party. The coming of the long-expected Bridegroom (the Messiah) is a time of joy and celebration and gladness. It is not a time of “affliction” of the soul and fasting.

This is Christ’s response to these critics. There are times for feasting and times for fasting. Weddings are not funerals. The Bridegroom has come. Joy and gladness are in order. This was the proper response of his disciples.

Christ then adds in v. 20 what is essentially a prophecy of both the cross and his ascension: “But the days will come, when the bridegroom will be taken away from them, and then they shall fast in those days.” The disciples will be filled with great sorrow over all these things.

An underlying point is being made. Christ is taking to himself the title of being the Bridegroom. If you look at the Old Testament, you will find a rich treasury of references to the one true God of the Bible as being the Husband or Bridegroom of his elect people, his Bride. Consider just one example:

Isaiah 54: ⁵ For thy Maker is thine husband; the Lord of hosts is his name; and thy Redeemer the Holy One of Israel; The God of the whole earth shall he be called.

⁶ For the Lord hath called thee as a woman forsaken and grieved in spirit, and a wife of youth, when thou wast refused, saith thy God.

⁷ For a small moment have I forsaken thee; but with great mercies will I gather thee.

When Christ declares himself to be the Bridegroom, he is declaring himself to be God. His first disciples thus confessed, “Jesus is Lord.” They were filled with joy at his first advent, and his disciples on earth will be filled with joy again at his second coming when we are called to “the marriage supper of the Lamb” (Rev 19:9). Christ is the Bridegroom!

Grace and peace, Pastor Jeff Riddle